Temujin

So sorry to hear your story BB :angryfire I really do think it's time health workers took matters into their own hands if they get no support from management. I think staff are probably not backed up by management because they know we'll quietly take it, or at most will complain internally where it can all be swept under the carpet. If every time it happened nurses made a real noise: wrote to the papers, their MPs, solicitors, anything that would bring attention to the actions of management then something surely would have to happen. I do not deny that some nurses have tried this already, but I'm speaking of all nurses doing it. If MPs and newspapers were flooded with complaints, even anonymous ones, something I believe would happen. Someone (if they haven't already) should set up a website designed solely for health workers to air their grievances and relate what's really happening with regards to violence. Publicise it to TV and the press as evidence that health workers have had enough of violence and the empty assurances of management. (Jeez, I'm sounding so bolshy here :) ) I do realise that all this is easier said than done, and fear of losing one's job and, for want of a better phrase "being blackballed", is a frightening thought. But still, nobody should have to take what you did just for trying to do your job and its sickening that the Trust seemed to show no desire to help you recover.

Hi And thanks for all replies (and welcomes :) so far). Safewaygreenbox (good name!!) Everything I say about fighting back is as a last resort. The "hit first" scenario is, for instance, someone running at you out of the blue who looks as if he, or she, is about to hit you. You may be alone, you may be in a confined space and unable to escape. Escape would always be the first option. As for not helping falling patients, it beggars belief. My guess is that most of us would automatically try and stop anyone from falling. This strikes me as a case of management/insurers trying to avoid paying out all costs. madwife2002 (Kay) - a scary story and I really hope you're over it now. I do hope I don't come across as someone just looking to hit out. I accept there are times when, as a mental health nurse, I might be assaulted by a patient (although it's no guarantee, I am a large male and so some might think twice before doing so). In 99% of these cases I believe I would be prepared to take it without hitting back. Yet I am also sure that if I felt my life, or that of a colleague, was seriously threatened, then even at the risk of losing my job, I would take pre-emptive action (again, I would if possible restrain first, and hit only as a very last resort - moreso if it is a patient rather than a violent relative). It is alright bosses/government making noises about how it is unnacceptable to attack staff, but in the same breath to deny their own staff the ability to defend themselves makes it all seem very half-hearted.

Many thanks for the speedy replies. I wonder if what it needs is a nurse - hopefully not me :) - to be suspended for defending themselves and them taking it right to the top (European Court of Human Rights or what have you). I fully understand what you're telling me, and indeed the nurses I've spoken to back up what you say, yet the law of the land is just that, and I find it difficult to believe that the NHS/trust, or whoever, are allowed to contravene the law and what seems to me to be a basic human right - the right to defend oneself from harm. There are times and situations when escape is impossible (or seems so), and also, for instance, I would not be prepared to watch a colleague beaten while I stand by and wait for security/police to arrive and help out. Of course I accept that people's fear of losing their job is a powerful deterrent to taking any action against their employer, even if they feel themselves in the right. I just wonder if that fear is what the "management" are relying on. Thanks again.

First time poster. Hi. I'm a mature student about to start training as a nurse, and the incidence of violence from patients/families/visitors/chavs has started to bother me lately. I'm most definitely not a violent person, but neither am I a turn the other cheek type of guy, and while I am not advocating hitting people for no reason, the law of the land is such that you are allowed to defend yourself (within reason) if attacked. Yet I have spoken to nurses, male and female, who tell me that if they dared defend themselves if attacked, they would be suspended and probably sacked. So what is a nurse supposed to do if assaulted? Curl up in a ball and hope their attacker gets bored and doesn't injure them too much (or kill them)? Beg for mercy? Ask them to stop hitting until security turns up? Or are we allowed, as British law says, to fight back - and even hit first - if we genuinely feel in danger?